New England B.S. Thread

Someone had a bad day on 495 south today. Just before Franklin.

and then this guy drove past me, just as we were coming out of the traffic. The rare Lime w No front plate. Vintage green mass plate. I love that color.

 

Higher prices boiled down to one thing well ok two things,
Man power and
Energy costs.
lower those commodities (for lack of a better term) and everything goes down.
Including dealer prices.
Hell I paid 7 k over for the Tacoma.

 

lol jeeps are up there too.

 

NEK Artisans Guild, St. Johnsbury

 

It is a decent photoshop but the truth with Dodge, unfortunately, is not very far off. And then the depreciation sinks like Jimmy Hoffa in a lake.

 

With African or European cement ?

 

Dealer told me the new Toyota Sequoias are being sent straight to auction from the dealers and $80K sticker is selling $120-130K....

 

I almost got into it with them a little bit, explaining that I know they have been sitting on nearly all of their inventory for the better part of the year and their unwillingness to move something for slightly less profit might be why.

Didn't bother, just thanked them for their time and said since I am not in a position where I need to replace my truck, I can't bring myself to go up any from what I felt were reasonable numbers.

 

It's very close to the end of the month, so you might get a call from the sales guy if he hasn't hit his sales "goal" yet.

 

I remember reading one of those books about car purchasing long ago and it said something like "go the dealer right at the end of the month, several hours before closing, on a rainy day. You'll either get a great deal or a black eye"

 

This and, when I bought my Tacoma, I bought 1 of 2 2007's they still had on the lot. The rest were 2008s. They weren't budging on the price so I told the salesman, fine, go get a 2008 and lets start all over. That got the sales manager's attention and they made a better deal.

 

The sales guy initially said he didn't think invoice would be an issue because they are trying to move as much as they can by the end of the year and he would talk to his manager. It's very clear that the manager doesn't want to. We're about $3k apart between trade value and the price of the truck.

 

That’s doable if you really like the truck

 

Right, it isn't the end of the world. I said if it was a closer match to my ideal build, I'd be more inclined to accept that price difference. The one I looked at before was an almost perfect match, but that dealer was super low on my trade - we were at a ~6k difference.

 

Can you sell to carmax and bring the cash?

 

Or wait and see.

 

I could.

At this point I'm kind of thinking of buying a smaller commuter that isn't a penalty box and is practical in the winter, like a used XC40, and keeping the truck to primarily use for truck things. My current truck is the perfect combination of options, cab, powertrain, etc. My long term reliability concerns are less of a thing if fewer miles are being put on it and I have a backup vehicle.

My options are:
- Buy a new F-150 for probably too much money. It's the truck I like best in every area, except being a dad-mobile (crew cab short bed) and may or may not have the build quality issues of my current truck.
- Buy a new Tundra for a slightly more reasonable amount. Deal with worse comfort and visibility and some of the other dumb decisions Toyota made, but hopefully get better reliability in return. Also comes in my ideal cab/trim config.
- Buy a commuter that's nice enough that I'll actually want to drive it, delegate the truck to truck things.
- Run the truck until the wheels fall off and take reliability issues as they come, if they come.

All of this can wait 6 months, easily.

 

I drove my kids Honda Fit for 2 months...I really liked the gas mileage...

 

https://i.imgur.com/2AagFOK.mp4

But.... the snorkel.....?